Green
by WizardsGirl
Summary: Hobbits are fascinating creatures, with secrets and traditions that most other races cannot fathom. They are beings who love peace and laughter and a good meal. However, that does not mean that they are not touched by grief or hardship... May continue, I'm a little iffy, um... Enjoy? (Rating may change)


**A/N:** Ah, don't mind me, I _am_ working on the next chapter to WSI, but I got a bit sidetracked by this plunny, so, yeah (Wanders away whistling innocently)

**Green**

Bilbo Baggins was a fine, respectable genteel Hobbit. He held and was invited to many parties, had many friends in his neighbors, and only ever had stern words with his less-than-reputable cousins, the Sackville-Bagginses (which was an accepted fact, as many a Hobbit smial was checked when those particular relatives visited, and all the silverware counted and re-counted, as Lobelia had a tendency to sneak about with her neighbors fine silver spoons in her pocket). However, despite his friendly, respectable nature, his lovely garden, and, indeed, his fine stories, there were no marriage offers, no courtships, and, indeed, not one offer to move into his large family home, Bag End.

The reason for this was not that he was half-Took, those rambunctious, adventurous lot. Nor was it that he was half-Baggins, all of whom were respectable, gentle-Hobbit lads and lasses. It wasn't that he, himself, had done anything, or that his parents (May the Green Lady watch over their souls) had. In fact, it was because Bilbo Baggins _couldn't_ do something.

Bilbo could not grow a fauntling.

Ah, now, if you are not a Hobbit, than you would not understand, and would assume this meant that he was infertile. In a way, this would be true, but in such a way that it is vastly not.

Hobbits, you see, are the creations of the Green Lady, Yavanna, like the Ents and the extinct Entwives, making them siblings. In this fashion, they were also cousins to the Elves, and the opposites of the Orcs, for Hobbits were made with love from the sun and earth and created for green things and joy and were generally peaceful creatures; while the Orcs were abominations, creatures made of blood and shadow and the corruption of the earth, made for war and death and cruelty, with the hunger of flesh and others pain in their hearts. The Hobbit's Life-Song, the Song Yavanna had Sung to bring them into being, and been corrupted and tormented and made so _wrong_ that the Orcs had come about because of it's discordant tune.

But, we are getting off topic.

Hobbits, as you now know, are peaceful, loving creatures, who love to grow things and party and, most of all, to _eat_, as their seven meals a day would most definitely show. However, there is nothing in the world more precious to them, than children. Fauntlings, dwarflings, elflings, or human, it mattered not, for children were _always_ precious, to be protected and nurtured and _loved_. However, due to their creation, Hobbits can not give _birth_ to children, as a Human or Elf or even a Dwarf would.

No, instead, they would use their unique type of magic, the magic of green things and growing and love, and mix that with the blood of themselves and, should they have one (for Hobbit's were nothing if not fascinating creatures, capable of things many other species could only think of in passing before dismissing such a notion) their partner's, and place it within a simple seed, which they would nurture with this magic everyday, until a pod began to grow. And, inside this pod, would grow a Fauntling; a baby Hobbit, that would mature and feed off the magic and love and voices of their parent or parents, until the sun rose high on a certain day, and their pod curled open like a rose blooming, and their magic cried out for their Mother or Father or both, and they were welcomed to the Shire and began their lives.

This is where poor Bilbo is brought in, you see.

Once, in his earlier years after he had grown from tween to a handsome, young Hobbit lad, he had _had_ a suitor, a beautiful Hobbit lass named Lilac Narrowfoot (who were an off-branch of the larger Clan, the Proudfoot's, though some great-great-aunt who had married a Hobbit lad whose last name had been Narrows, and combined the two names in a fit of whimsy, to her father's dismay). She had had long red hair, a particular delight for any Hobbit, as the color was a rarity, more so than the darker browns and blacks that occasionally popped up. Her eyes had been a light, cinnamon color, and a dusting of similarly colored freckles had danced across her cheeks and nose, just above the dimple that showed in her right cheek when she smiled (which had been often). Bilbo had loved her since he was just a young tween, and had courted her as soon as he was able, proving himself as a fine suitor by presenting her with beautiful gifts or intricate meals to share with her family. Finally, her parents consented, but only if he could prove that he could provide for their comely daughter, something that everyone had believed was just a simple, easy task. After all, it was even rarer than a red-haired Hobbit, for any gentle-Hobbit to be unable to grow a Faunt.

And so, the two of them had attempted to create a child, and the pod had grown and grown, with Bilbo and Lilac working happily to nurture the no-doubt beautiful child growing for them, love and happiness filling their lives with a new kind of light that made the older and married Hobbit couples smile knowingly at each other.

But, the day that the pod curled open, and the two Hobbits had crowded around their little Fauntling, the smiles that had been so bright upon their faces, froze, and their hearts broke. For, inside the pod, had been no beautiful, crying babe, but a silent still one; half the size of the pod surrounding them and curled in on themselves as if they had not even had time to stretch before they had returned to the Great Garden of Yavanna.

Their child had died before she (and it had been a little girl, with Bilbo's hair and Lilac's freckles) had even had a chance to live, and with her died any hope in Bilbo's heart for a family of his own, to fill the hollow places in his heart and his smial.

Lilac had left, after that, no doubt blaming Bilbo as he did himself, and moved to her cousin's home some towns away, where she married one Gorbyn Goodmills.

Bilbo, however, had been left alone in his large, empty smial, and the grave of a child he had dug himself and _buried_ himself and _named __**himself**_, to haunt his life and dreams. Little Olive Baggins was buried the day she was born, surrounded and covered swiftly by a thick garden of yellow and magenta zinnias, in the same place Bilbo had buried what little remains of his parents there had been after the Fell Winter had stolen them; the small patch of land just on the edge of his smial, protected by a briar and thorn-filled fence near the gate leading up to Bag End. And there, he set a stone bench, where he would sit and smoke his pipeweed and visit them, whispering tales to his daughter and telling his parents of the day he had had, keeping all the sorrow and grief and self-loathing locked away until he could safely let it out, usually with a large amount of Gamgee Special Brew and a nice, dark room to hide in where no one would see it.

So, although he was a respectable, genteel-Hobbit, he was also a marked Hobbit, one that Hobbit lads and lasses were told to not get too close to. Friends was fine; you could never have enough of those after all. But anything else would lead to heartache, as Bilbo could attest. He never tried to grow another child; the fear and pain of sweet little Olive's death happening again stayed his hand. And, even though he adored all his little nieces and nephews and cousins and even the neighborhood Faunts who came to him to listen to his playful tales or steal a few of his delicious treats, he couldn't help but hurt every time he saw their little, gap-toothed grins, held their small hands, or kissed their scraped knees, because, always in the back of his mind, he would wonder...

_Would my Olive smile like that? Would she laugh and play and come begging for one more treat or story before bed?_

Years passed like this, and soon Bilbo was turning fifty-three, and found himself spending more and more time at home, and hours at a time sitting on his bench, speaking to his child and his parents.

Some days he would just sit quietly with his lost loved ones and just imagine what life would be like with them, or what they were doing in Yavanna's Great Garden (his mother was no doubt teaching sweet Olive about adventuring, Took Green eyes glittering with mischief as his little one giggled and grinned, and his father sighing in exasperation and worrying about the stains on their clothes but smiled none-the-less as Yavanna Sang another Fauntling into Life nearby and held another Hobbit who had joined her once more). It was on one of these days, in the early morning just after First Breakfast but before Second, where one peculiar, rather rude Wizard found him, and started talking about an adventure.

And, in his heart-of-hearts, where the pain and loss and loneliness had only just begun to sink it's claws in, something rather Tookish raised its head and pushed the shadows a little farther back. And it remained awake and interested and restless, even after Bilbo had sent the mad Wizard away (being rather rude himself, he acknowledged wryly later on, when the sting of panic and pain and curiosity had settled back).

Things were going to be changing, he knew.

Rather for better or worse, however, was the question.

**A/N:** OMFG I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHY I WROTE THIS OMFG JFC I'M CRYING AND DEPRESSED NOW UGH

I don't know if/when this will be updated I just... Yeah...

Sadness.

**Flower Meanings:**

Lilac - Pride, Beauty

Olive - Peace

Yellow Zinnias - Daily Rememberance

Magenta Zinnias - Lasting Affection


End file.
